Now in a revised and expanded second edition, this invaluable book provides teachers and coaches with the information and tools they need to get started on the complex process of reading assessment. Grounded in a solid scientific framework, the book presents practical strategies that enable teachers to recognize "good reader" behaviors, assess…

This article describes findings from a classroom-based action research project conducted by two in-school teachers, a literacy coach and a 4th grade teacher, implementing a new integrated literacy and social studies curriculum and the changes they made in curricular practices and beliefs over a three-year period of time. A university professor…

This book includes four papers presented at a conference on teaching science to students with disabilities. The first paper, "Science Education for Motor/Orthopedically-Impaired Students" (E. C. Keller, Jr.), covers: (1) categories of motor/orthopedic-impairments, (2) life function assessment, (3) formal and informal science teaching…

This booklet is designed to help educators plan and implement language and literacy programs and related professional development opportunities for elementary school educators. A primary focus of the document is on the tensions that exist between recent local, state, and national initiatives to improve the quality of schooling and current…

Selecting and using technology for the classroom is an enormous responsibility for teachers. This book helps educators of K-12 decide which of the many available technologies are right for them. It presents and develops five learning methods based on specific technological devices and practices. These methods include teacher-centered learning with…

Taking as its guiding principle that through peer coaching new teachers can offer each other valuable feedback as they try out teaching techniques in the classroom, this book reports on a longitudinal study in peer coaching. The book aims to give teacher educators a new method for encouraging reflective thinking and professional growth in…

Online courses at Bergen Community College (BCC) began in the late 1990's with an imperative from the college President to develop online courses. Senior faculty members who dared to experiment with this new mode of teaching had to learn how to design a course and how to use WebCT, a new course management system, on their own. As these faculty…

Teachers who want to act professionally need to participate in the decision making process. Sound knowledge of current theories is essential as is sound knowledge of students' needs as related to the goals of education. Of particular importance is the willingness to try out alternative approaches and to evaluate the effects of different strategies…

Discusses concerns the developers of a "teacher as researcher" seminar had in creating studies and activities for the participants, including how to foster equality in relationship between the professional researchers and the teachers, discovering what kinds of support teachers need as researchers, and fostering ownership of studies and…

The quality of high schools--how well they prepare students for productive employment as well as active citizenship--has been part of the state and national agendas for several years. To help complete an action plan for addressing the issue of high school quality, the Iowa Department of Education and State Board of Education during the spring of…

This report examines the implementation of the first year of the Pennsylvania High School Coaching Initiative. Funded by the Annenberg Foundation, it is an on-site professional development initiative that employs instructional coaches using Penn Literacy Framework in an attempt to improve the level of teacher instruction in districts across the…

This inservice professional development module, part of the Alabama Reading Initiative, presents research summaries, notes for presenters, and activities. The Phonemic Awareness and Phonics module clarifies that skilled readers are accurate and automatic decoders (i.e., they have the alphabetic principle). Phonics instruction must empower all…

This report describes the Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound Project (ELOB), a 3-year project launched by Outward Bound USA in 1992 with a grant from the New American Schools Development Corporation. The major goal of the ELOB was to develop new schools or transform existing ones into centers of expeditionary learning, in which learning would…

In an effort to improve a summer professional development program for inservice secondary mathematics and science teachers in Taiwan, a three-year action research project has recently been completed. The program attempted to provide participating teachers with a better theoretical and practical understanding of teaching and learning based on the…

An investigation-based course on teaching strategies for in-service science and mathematics teachers has been developed. The purpose of this course was to learn how to teach science or mathematics from the constructivist perspective. The course development was based on constructivism, especially social constructivism. Major adjustments concerning…